Headless body and pipe bomb near school rattle Evanston

School forced to close, but some students still show up

September 14, 2010|By Jonathan Bullington and Robert McCoppin, Chicago Tribune

In the dead of night, an explosion ripped through Evanston's Fitzsimons Park, shaking houses and waking residents blocks away. Responding to calls of a possible blown transformer, police searched but found nothing.

The mystery didn't begin to unravel until more than an hour later Tuesday, when resident Dale Wyatt made a grisly discovery.

He was walking his dog when it started pulling its leash. Near a playground, he found a headless body.

"I was kind of freaked out," Wyatt said. "This was the last thing I expected. …"

So began a macabre series of events that led police to discover a pipe bomb near the corpse. Nearby Nichols Middle School was forced to close, but some students still showed up for classes. Parents, children and school buses were waved off and sent away.

After disabling the bomb, investigators were left trying to determine why a man identified as Colin Dalebroux, 21, had two explosive devices.

Police said Dalebroux "was known" to another police agency in Illinois, but offered no details.

They got residents to evacuate an apartment building a block away, at 1012 Main St., where Dalebroux lived, and said they were working with the FBI to examine information stored on his computer.

At the same time, some parents of Nichols students said they were angry it took four hours from the time of the first explosion for them to be notified. While the investigation continues, the middle school will remain closed Wednesday.

Many parents were upset the district did not move faster in handling the emergency, said Eileen Budde, a Nichols PTA president, who shared their concerns.

"It seems like it was a long time between police seeing a body and when parents were told," Budde said.

Police Cmdr. Tom Guenther said that if police, the school district or city officials thought "there could be a remote possibility (of concern for safety), we would always err on the side of caution. We're always concerned about safety."

Residents near the park were stunned by the day's developments.

Sarah Stanczyk, 34, was asleep when the blast rocked her home about 3:50 a.m.

"It woke us up immediately," she said. "We thought it was a transformer exploding. Either that, or lightning. It sounded like a boom, and the house actually shook."

She saw police search the area with flashlights, then leave. It wasn't until a couple of hours later that "all chaos started breaking loose," she said.

Wyatt, 31, who lives a half-block from the park, was taking his dog Buddha out for a walk. The German shepherd-mix was agitated and began pulling toward something as if chasing a rabbit.

Wyatt found the body of a shirtless man wearing pants with his legs folded underneath him and his right arm stretched up.

There was nothing from the neck up, not even blood, and no obvious marks on the body, he said. A shopping bag and a plastic jug were nearby.

At first he thought it was a mannequin and some kind of "sick joke." But after he met a woman also walking her dog who pointed a flashlight at the body, they realized it was real. Wyatt went to his home and called police, who said they got his call at 5:48 a.m. He met them at the park and led them to the body.

Police taped off the area and found an unexploded pipe bomb near the body. They called the Cook County sheriff's bomb squad, which disabled it.

Wyatt said he was worried about the incident, wondering, "What was he doing near a school?"

Nichols officials said they first learned of the trouble between 6:30 a.m. and 7 a.m., after a custodian arrived and told the principal that police were nearby, said Pat Markham, Evanston Skokie District 65 spokeswoman.

"It wasn't until closer to 7:30 in the morning that it was even suggested that we shouldn't hold school," said Markham. "From that point forward, people had to put the wheels in motion."

Markham said she posted information by 8 a.m. on the district Web site and e-mailed parents 20 minutes before the start of classes at 8:30 a.m. Then she recorded a computerized emergency phone message, in English and Spanish. Some parents reported getting the calls at 8:40 a.m.

Meanwhile, teachers formed a perimeter at the school and sent students home who didn't get the message. Two buses loaded with children were turned away.

Staff members traveled back with them to explain the school's closing to their parents, Markham said.

"Everything was handled in a very orderly fashion," said Markham, adding that while she usually arrives at the district before 7 a.m., she and others had been at a school board meeting until 11 p.m. the prior night.

One father, Neal Pearlman, said he was infuriated that his 12-year-old son rode his bike to school to discover police cars and yellow tape before the family could confirm that classes were canceled.

"The frustration I have had and other parents have had is we didn't get a call from the district telling us that the school was closed until 20 minutes after the school was open," Pearlman said.

School Board President Keith Terry expressed frustration that parents were upset about the notification process. He said he was more concerned about the idea that someone had blown himself up near a school.

"I really am saddened that parents feel this way, but everyone at the administration building would never put any child in harm's way," Terry said. "My mind was not so much on laying blame, it was trying to figure out why did this happen."

Jonathan Bullington is a TribLocal reporter; Robert McCoppin is a Tribune reporter.